The Height of the Murderer
(Saturday, June 15; 5 p.m.)
When we arrived at Benson’s house a patrolman leaning somnolently
against the iron paling of the areaway came suddenly to attention and
saluted. He eyed Vance and me hopefully, regarding us no doubt as
suspects being taken to the scene of the crime for questioning by the
District Attorney. We were admitted by one of the men from the
Homicide Bureau who had been in the house on the morning of the
investigation.
Markham greeted him with a nod.
“Everything going all right?”
“Sure,” the man replied good-naturedly. “The old lady’s as meek as a
cat—and a swell cook.”
“We want to be alone for a while, Sniffin,” said Markham, as we passed
into the living-room.
“The gastronome’s name is Snitkin—not Sniffin,” Vance corrected him,
when the door had closed on us.
“Wonderful memory,” muttered Markham churlishly.
“A failing of mine,” said Vance. “I suppose you are one of those rare
persons who never forget a face but just can’t recall names, what?”
But Markham was in no mood to be twitted.
“Now that you’ve dragged me here, what are you going to do?” He waved
his hand depreciatingly, and sank into a chair with an air of
contemptuous abdication.
The living-room looked much the same as when we saw it last, except
that it had been put neatly in order. The shades were up, and the late
afternoon light was flooding in profusely. The ornateness of the
room’s furnishings seemed intensified by the glare.
Vance glanced about him and gave a shudder.
“I’m half inclined to turn back,” he drawled. “It’s a clear case of
justifiable homicide by an outraged interior decorator.”
“My dear æsthete,” Markham urged impatiently, “be good enough to bury
your artistic prejudices, and to proceed with your problem. . . . Of
course,” he added, with a malicious smile, “if you fear the result,
you may still withdraw, and thereby preserve your charming theories in
their present virgin state.”
“And permit you to send an innocent maiden to the chair!” exclaimed
Vance, in mock indignation. “Fie, fie! _La politesse_ alone forbids my
withdrawal. May I never have to lament, with Prince Henry, that ‘to my
shame I have a truant been to chivalry’.”
Markham set his jaw, and gave Vance a ferocious look.
“I’m beginning to think that, after all, there is something in your
theory that every man has some motive for murdering another.”
“Well,” replied Vance cheerfully, “now that you have begun to come
round to my way of thinking, do you mind if I send Mr. Snitkin on an
errand?”
Markham sighed audibly and shrugged his shoulders.
“I’ll smoke during the _opéra bouffe_, if it won’t interfere with your
performance.”
Vance went to the door and called Snitkin.
“I say, would you mind going to Mrs. Platz and borrowing a long
tape-measure and a ball of string. . . . The District Attorney wants
them,” he added, giving Markham a sycophantic bow.
“I can’t hope that you’re going to hang yourself, can I?” asked
Markham.
Vance gazed at him reprovingly.
“Permit me,” he said sweetly, “to commend _Othello_ to your attention:
‘How poor are they that have not patience!
What wound did ever heal but by degrees?’
Or—to descend from a poet to a platitudinarian—let me present for your
consid’ration a pentameter from Longfellow: ‘All things come round to
him who will but wait.’ Untrue, of course, but consolin’. Milton said
it much better in his ‘They also serve—’. But Cervantes said it best:
‘Patience and shuffle the cards.’ Sound advice, Markham—and advice
expressed rakishly, as all good advice should be. . . . To be sure,
patience is a sort of last resort—a practice to adopt when there’s
nothing else to do. Still, like virtue, it occasionally rewards the
practitioner; although I’ll admit that, as a rule, it is—again like
virtue—bootless. That is to say, it is its own reward. It has,
however, been swathed in many verbal robes. It is ‘sorrow’s slave,’
and the ‘sov’reign o’er transmuted ills,’ as well as ‘all the passion
of great hearts.’ Rousseau wrote, _La patience est amère mais son
fruit est doux._ But perhaps your legal taste runs to Latin.
_Superanda omnis fortuna ferendo est_, quoth Vergil. And Horace also
spoke on the subject. _Durum!_ said he, _sed levius fit patientia_——”
“Why the hell doesn’t Snitkin come?” growled Markham.
Almost as he spoke the door opened, and the detective handed Vance the
tape-measure and string.
“And now, Markham, for your reward!”
Bending over the rug Vance moved the large wicker chair into the exact
position it had occupied when Benson had been shot. The position was
easily determined, for the impressions of the chair’s castors on the
deep nap of the rug were plainly visible. He then ran the string
through the bullet-hole in the back of the chair, and directed me to
hold one end of it against the place where the bullet had struck the
wainscot. Next he took up the tape-measure and, extending the string
through the hole, measured a distance of five feet and six inches
along it, starting at the point which corresponded to the location of
Benson’s forehead as he sat in the chair. Tying a knot in the string
to indicate the measurement, he drew the string taut, so that it
extended in a straight line from the mark on the wainscot, through the
hole in the back of the chair, to a point five feet and six inches in
front of where Benson’s head had rested.
“This knot in the string,” he explained, “now represents the exact
location of the muzzle of the gun that ended Benson’s career. You see
the reasoning—eh, what? Having two points in the bullet’s
course—namely, the hole in the chair and the mark on the wainscot—,
and also knowing the approximate vertical line of explosion, which was
between five and six feet from the gentleman’s skull, it was merely
necess’ry to extend the straight line of the bullet’s course to the
vertical line of explosion in order to ascertain the exact point at
which the shot was fired.”
“Theoretically very pretty,” commented Markham; “though why you should
go to so much trouble to ascertain this point in space I can’t
imagine. . . . Not that it matters, for you have overlooked the
possibility of the bullet’s deflection.”
“Forgive me for contradicting you,” smiled Vance; “but yesterday
morning I questioned Captain Hagedorn at some length, and learned that
there had been no deflection of the bullet. Hagedorn had inspected the
wound before we arrived; and he was really pos’tive on that point. In
the first place, the bullet struck the frontal bone at such an angle
as to make deflection practically impossible even had the pistol been
of smaller calibre. And in the second place, the pistol with which
Benson was shot was of so large a bore—a point-forty-five—and the
muzzle velocity was so great, that the bullet would have taken a
straight course even had it been held at a greater distance from the
gentleman’s brow.”
“And how,” asked Markham, “did Hagedorn know what the muzzle velocity
was?”
“I was inquis’tive on that point myself,” answered Vance; “and he
explained that the size and character of the bullet and the expelled
shell told him the whole tale. That’s how he knew the gun was an army
Colt automatic—I believe he called it a U. S. Government Colt—and not
the ordinary Colt automatic. The weight of the bullets of these two
pistols is slightly different: the ordinary Colt bullet weighs 200
grains, whereas the army Colt bullet weighs 230 grains. Hagedorn,
having a hypersensitive tactile sense, was able, I presume, to
distinguish the diff’rence at once, though I didn’t go into his
physiological gifts with him,—my reticent nature, you
understand. . . . However, he could tell it was a forty-five army Colt
automatic bullet; and knowing this, he knew that the muzzle velocity
was 809 feet, and that the striking energy was 329—which gives a
six-inch penetration in white pine at a distance of twenty-five
yards. . . . An amazin’ creature, this Hagedorn. Imagine having one’s
head full of such entrancing information! The old mysteries of why a
man should take up the bass-fiddle as a life work and where all the
pins go, are babes’ conundrums compared with the one of why a human
being should devote his years to the idiosyncrasies of bullets.”
“The subject is not exactly an enthralling one,” said Markham wearily;
“so, for the sake of argument, let us admit that you have now found
the precise point of the gun’s explosion. Where do we go from there?”
“While I hold the string on a straight line,” directed Vance, “be good
enough to measure the exact distance from the floor to the knot. Then
my secret will be known.”
“This game doesn’t enthrall me, either,” Markham protested. “I’d much
prefer ‘London Bridge’.”
Nevertheless he made the measurement.
“Four feet, eight and a half inches,” he announced indifferently.
Vance laid a cigarette on the rug at a point directly beneath the
knot.
“We now know the exact height at which the pistol was held when it was
fired. . . . You grasp the process by which this conclusion was
reached, I’m sure.”
“It seems rather obvious,” answered Markham.
Vance again went to the door and called Snitkin.
“The District Attorney desires the loan of your gun for a moment,” he
said. “He wishes to make a test.”
Snitkin stepped up to Markham and held out his pistol wonderingly.
“The safety’s on, sir: shall I shift it?”
Markham was about to refuse the weapon when Vance interposed.
“That’s quite all right. Mr. Markham doesn’t intend to fire it—I
hope.”
When the man had gone Vance seated himself in the wicker chair, and
placed his head in juxtaposition with the bullet-hole.
“Now, Markham,” he requested, “will you please stand on the spot where
the murderer stood, holding the gun directly above that cigarette on
the floor, and aim delib’rately at my left temple. . . . Take care,”
he cautioned, with an engaging smile, “not to pull the trigger, or you
will never learn who killed Benson.”
[Illustration: Diagram of shooting. A silhouette illustration of John
Markham holding a gun while standing before Philo Vance sitting in a
chair. A line is drawn from the gun through Vance’s forehead to the
bullet-hole in the wainscot behind him.]
Reluctantly Markham complied. As he stood taking aim, Vance asked me
to measure the height of the gun’s muzzle from the floor.
The distance was four feet and nine inches.
“Quite so,” he said, rising. “Y’ see, Markham, you are five feet,
eleven inches tall; therefore the person who shot Benson was very
nearly your own height—certainly not under five feet, ten. . . . That,
too, is rather obvious, what?”
His demonstration had been simple and clear. Markham was frankly
impressed; his manner had become serious. He regarded Vance for a
moment with a meditative frown; then he said:
“That’s all very well; but the person who fired the shot might have
held the pistol relatively higher than I did.”
“Not tenable,” returned Vance. “I’ve done too much shooting myself not
to know that when an expert takes delib’rate aim with a pistol at a
small target, he does it with a stiff arm and with a slightly raised
shoulder, so as to bring the sight on a straight line between his eye
and the object at which he aims. The height at which one holds a
revolver, under such conditions, pretty accurately determines his own
height.”
“Your argument is based on the assumption that the person who killed
Benson was an expert taking deliberate aim at a small target?”
“Not an assumption, but a fact,” declared Vance. “Consider: had the
person not been an expert shot, he would not—at a distance of five or
six feet—have selected the forehead, but a larger target—namely, the
breast. And having selected the forehead, he most certainly took
delib’rate aim, what? Furthermore, had he not been an expert shot, and
had he pointed the gun at the breast without taking delib’rate aim, he
would, in all prob’bility, have fired more than one shot.”
Markham pondered.
“I’ll grant that, on the face of it, your theory sounds plausible,” he
conceded at length. “On the other hand, the guilty man could have been
almost any height over five feet, ten; for certainly a man may crouch
as much as he likes and still take deliberate aim.”
“True,” agreed Vance. “But don’t overlook the fact that the murderer’s
position, in this instance, was a perfectly natural one. Otherwise,
Benson’s attention would have been attracted, and he would not have
been taken unawares. That he was shot unawares was indicated by his
attitude. Of course, the assassin might have stooped a little without
causing Benson to look up. . . . Let us say, therefore, that the
guilty person’s height is somewhere between five feet, ten, and six
feet, two. Does that appeal to you?”
Markham was silent.
“The delightful Miss St. Clair, y’ know,” remarked Vance, with a
japish smile, “can’t possibly be over five feet, five or six.”
Markham grunted, and continued to smoke abstractedly.
“This Captain Leacock, I take it,” said Vance, “is over six feet—eh,
what?”
Markham’s eyes narrowed.
“What makes you think so?”
“You just told me, don’t y’ know.”
“I told you!”
“Not in so many words,” Vance pointed out. “But after I had shown you
the approximate height of the murderer, and it didn’t correspond at
all to that of the young lady you suspected, I knew your active mind
was busy looking around for another possibility. And, as the lady’s
_inamorato_ was the only other possibility on your horizon, I
concluded that you were permitting your thoughts to play about the
Captain. Had he, therefore, been the stipulated height, you would have
said nothing; but when you argued that the murderer might have stooped
to fire the shot, I decided that the Captain was inord’nately
tall. . . . Thus, in the pregnant silence that emanated from you, old
dear, your spirit held sweet communion with mine, and told me that the
gentleman was a six-footer no less.”
“I see that you include mind-reading among your gifts,” said Markham.
“I now await an exhibition of slate-writing.”
His tone was irritable, but his irritation was that of a man reluctant
to admit the alteration of his beliefs. He felt himself yielding to
Vance’s guiding rein, but he still held stubbornly to the course of
his own previous convictions.
“Surely you don’t question my demonstration of the guilty person’s
height?” asked Vance mellifluously.
“Not altogether,” Markham replied. “It seems colorable enough. . . .
But why, I wonder, didn’t Hagedorn work the thing out, if it was so
simple?”
“Anaxagoras said that those who have occasion for a lamp, supply it
with oil. A profound remark, Markham—one of those seemingly simple
quips that contain a great truth. A lamp without oil, y’ know, is
useless. The police always have plenty of lamps—every variety, in
fact—but no oil, as it were. That’s why they never find anyone unless
it’s broad daylight.”
Markham’s mind was now busy in another direction, and he rose and
began to pace the floor.
“Until now I hadn’t thought of Captain Leacock as the actual agent of
the crime.”
“Why hadn’t you thought of him? Was it because one of your sleuths
told you he was at home like a good boy that night?”
“I suppose so.” Markham continued pacing thoughtfully. Then suddenly
he swung about. “That wasn’t it, either. It was the amount of damning
circumstantial evidence against the St. Clair woman. . . . And, Vance,
despite your demonstration here to-day, you haven’t explained away any
of the evidence against her.—Where was she between twelve and one? Why
did she go with Benson to dinner? How did her hand-bag get here? And
what about those burned cigarettes of hers in the grate?—they’re the
obstacle, those cigarette butts; and I can’t admit that your
demonstration wholly convinces me—despite the fact that it _is_
convincing—as long as I’ve got the evidence of those cigarettes to
contend with, for that evidence is also convincing.”
“My word!” sighed Vance. “You’re in a pos’tively ghastly predic’ment.
However, maybe I can cast illumination on those disquietin’ cigarette
butts.”
Once more he went to the door, and summoning Snitkin, returned the
pistol.
“The District Attorney thanks you,” he said. “And will you be good
enough to fetch Mrs. Platz. We wish to chat with her.”
Turning back to the room, he smiled amiably at Markham.
“I desire to do all the conversing with the lady this time, if you
don’t mind. There are potentialities in Mrs. Platz which you entirely
overlooked when you questioned her yesterday.”
Markham was interested, though sceptical.
“You have the floor,” he said.